No new grants today

This morning the Supreme Court issued orders from the justices’ private conference last week. The court did not add any new cases to its merits docket for next term, nor did it call for the views of the U.S. solicitor general in any cases.

Today’s order list may have been most noteworthy for what it did not contain: an order in Azar v. Garza, in which the federal government has asked the Supreme Court to nullify a ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit that cleared the way for a pregnant undocumented teenager to obtain an abortion. The justices considered the case at several conferences earlier this year before asking the lower courts to send them the record in the case in late February. Since receiving the record, the justices have considered the case at two more conferences without acting on it. Although there is no way to know for sure at this point, the request for the lower-court record could mean that someone on the court is writing something regarding the case – either a summary reversal or (perhaps more likely) a dissent from the denial of review.

The justices will meet again for another private conference on Thursday, March 29. We would expect orders from that conference on Monday, April 2, at 9:30 a.m.

This post was originally published at Howe on the Court.